In this article

Live captions in Teams

Live caption settings

Set up live translated captions

Use live translated captions

Customize captions

Live captions in Teams

Teams can detect what’s said in a meeting and present real-time captions. If you're using the desktop app for Windows or Mac, there are also several caption customization options.

Note: People can choose not to be identified in captions. For details, see Hide your identity in meeting captions and transcripts.

image of a Teams meeting

Note: Teams doesn't save captions. If you'd like a transcript of the meeting, turn on transcription. You'll be able to download the transcript after the meeting.

Tip: To learn how to use CART captions in a Microsoft Teams meeting, refer to Use CART captions in a Microsoft Teams meeting (human generated captions).

There are a couple ways to get live captions in Teams:

From the built-in captioning provided by Teams
From a Communication Access Real-time Translation (CART) captioner

Live caption settings

Teams has built-in closed captioning you can turn on from the meeting controls.

Turn captions on and off

To use live captions in a meeting, go to your meeting controls at the top of the screen and select More > Language and speech > Turn on live captions.
To stop using live captions, go to the meeting controls and select More > Language and speech > Turn off live captions.

Change the spoken language

To the right of the captions, select Settings .
Select Spoken language to make sure it is the same language everyone is actually speaking.

Important:

Make sure the language you select is the language everyone is speaking in the meeting.
When you change the spoken language setting, it affects everyone. The captions and transcript language will change for all meeting participants.

Set up live translated captions

In events

In town halls and live events, organizers preselect which languages attendees can see live captions in. Organizers can select six languages, or ten if they have Premium, from over 50 different languages.

To set up live translated captions in an event:

Open the event in your Teams calendar.
In Details, select Meeting options .
In Translate attendee captions, select the languages that live translated captions will be available in during your event.
Select Apply.

Attendees will only be able to see live translated captions in one of the languages you preselected.

Use live translated captions

By default, live captions are displayed in the language that’s spoken during the meeting or event. Live translated captions allow users to see captions translated into the language they’re most comfortable with.

Note: Live translated captions in meetings are only available as part of Teams Premium, an add-on license that provides additional features to make Teams meetings more personalized, intelligent, and secure. To get access to Teams Premium, contact your IT admin.

To use live translated captions:

Turn on live captions in your meeting.
Next to the meeting captions, select Settings .
Make sure Spoken language is correct.
Select Caption language.
Choose the language you want your captions translated to.

close-up of the language options

Customize captions

If you're using the desktop app on Windows or Mac, you can customize the font size and color, increase the number of lines displayed, and change the positioning of the captions in the meeting window.

To the right of the captions, select Settings .
Select Caption settings.
You can then choose from language and style settings.

highlighted view of the caption settings window